1. Field of the Invention
The present invention generally relates to a booklet maker and a method of manufacturing a booklet maker and, more particularly, to a booklet maker and method to ensure parallelism between booklet maker components for production of high quality booklets.
2. Background Information
A saddle stitched booklet is a booklet which is printed on both sides of the sheets of paper, folded, and stapled or otherwise bound to create a booklet. Saddle stitched booklets can contain any number of pages (e.g., 100 pages; that is 100 booklet pages produced from 25 sheets of paper printed on both sides and folded).
Saddle stitched booklets can be formed by processing the entire booklet at once. A stack of printed sheets can be arranged and squared off and then stapled. After the sheets are stapled, the entire stack is folded. Once folded, the free ends of the sheets form two beveled edges because the outer sheets wrap around the inner sheets. The entire booklet is then trimmed to even out the edges. A heavy duty folding apparatus and a heavy duty cutting apparatus can be used to perform the folding and trimming operations in these machines since many sheets are folded and cut at once. These machines can be bulky, expensive, and involve a skilled operator. Thus, booklet making machines are found in commercial document production facilities.
A system for finishing printed sheets into booklets in a sheetwise manner is described in PCT Document No. WO 00/18583 (referred to as xe2x80x9cthe Trovinger PCTxe2x80x9d), hereby incorporated by reference in its entirety. The system of the Trovinger PCT trims and folds sheets in a sheetwise manner (sheet-by-sheet). Specifically, each sheet is trimmed to a width which is determined based on its location in the booklet with the inside sheets having a smaller width than the outside sheets. The trimmed sheets are then folded one at a time at a precise location. The trimmed and folded sheets are then collected into a stack and stapled or otherwise bound into a booklet. The booklet maker described in the Trovinger PCT is compact and inexpensive and thus, is suitable for use in a home or small office.
In a sheetwise booklet maker, alignment of the trimming apparatus, the folding apparatus, and the sheet feeding apparatus in the booklet maker is used to produce quality booklets with properly aligned pages. Alignment of the parts of the booklet maker may be achieved by the use of parts with tight tolerances. However, the tighter the tolerances for the booklet maker parts, the more expensive the parts are to manufacture.
The present invention is directed to a sheetwise booklet maker and method of manufacturing a booklet maker in which orientations of the longitudinal axes of elements of the booklet maker are adjusted and locked in place to achieve parallelism of the elements.
According to an exemplary embodiment of the present invention, a sheetwise booklet maker comprises a sheet trimmer including a cutting blade having a longitudinal axis, a folding apparatus including a fold blade having a longitudinal axis, and a paper drive positioned to transport individual sheets to the sheet trimmer and the folding apparatus, the paper drive having a longitudinal axis. Orientations of at least two of the cutting blade longitudinal axis, the fold blade longitudinal axis, and the paper drive longitudinal axis are adjustable to achieve parallelism between the sheet trimmer, folding apparatus, and paper drive.
Exemplary embodiments are also directed to a sheetwise booklet maker for trimming and folding individual sheets of material and binding the individual sheets together in a booklet which comprises trim means for trimming edges of individual sheets, the trim means having a longitudinal axis, fold means for folding the individual sheets, the fold means having a longitudinal axis, transport means for transporting the individual sheets to the trimming and folding means, the transport means having a longitudinal axis, and means to adjust orientations of the longitudinal axes of at least two of the trim means, fold means, and transport means to achieve parallelism between the trim means, fold means, and transport means.
The present invention is also related to an exemplary method of manufacturing a booklet maker which comprises assembling a booklet maker including a sheet trimmer, a folding apparatus, and a paper drive positioned to transport individual sheets to the sheet trimmer and the folding apparatus; adjusting the orientations of longitudinal axes of at least two of the sheet trimmer, the folding apparatus, and the paper drive to achieve parallelism between the sheet trimmer, folding apparatus, and paper drive; and locking the at least two of the sheet trimmer, folding apparatus, and paper drive in the parallel arrangement.